A Look Back

Agreement for John Thomson to Be Apprenticed to Shipmaster Robert Emery for Six Years, September 11, 1794

On the surface, this apprenticeship document shows no relation to Black history, but a careful examination proved otherwise. To start, there’s a name, John Thomson (spelled Thompson at the top of the document); there’s an age, “fourteen years, eight months and twentyseven days”; and there’s a date, September 11, 1794. Other information from the document tells us that Thomson was from Salem, Massachusetts, and was apprenticing to be a “mariner” under Captain Robert Emery on the ship Diana.

Research showed that the Diana was built in 1790 for trade with Europe and that Emery hired racially integrated crews. Free Blacks found occupation as a sailor to be a more assimilated working environment, and in port cities like Salem, these opportunities helped lay the foundation for early Black communities. But threats abounded for Black sailors. They could be taken by the British and made to work in their fleet or be sold back into slavery. Around the mid-1780s, sailors began carrying papers that helped prove their identity. In 1796, Congress began issuing Seamen’s Protection Certificates, which worked as identification papers. An 1809 application for a certificate issued to John Thomson confirmed his 1780 birth in Salem and described him as a “negro, born-free.”

— RYAN JELSO, ASSOCIATE CURATOR, DIGITAL CONTENT

cThe notarization of this document by a reputable person like John Keese, who signed the side, would have been vitally important to Black apprentice John

Thomson in the 1790s. Keese’s name carried weight, as he was a notary public, attorney and a founding member of the New York Manumission Society — one of the only groups advocating for Black rights. DID YOU KNOW? / During February, The Henry Ford celebrates Black History Month with a variety of additional events, including special pop-up exhibits in Henry Ford Museum of American Innovation and new digital content online, among many other activities.

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READ Associate curator Ryan Jelso’s archival investigation into John Thomson on the blogc